WMU's new defensive line coach Lou Esposito a motivating force with players

SJC AthleticsLou Esposito, WMU's new defensive line coach, served for five seasons as head coach at Division II St. Joseph's College.

KALAMAZOO — Western Michigan University football coach Bill Cubit described Lou Esposito as simply someone who gets it.

Such a quality makes him a suitable figure to help bolster a Broncos defense, which last season, seemed to the lack the same proverbial ‘it’.

On Tuesday afternoon, Esposito was named Western Michigan’s new defensive line coach.

Esposito comes from Division II St. Joseph’s College (Ind.), where he served for five seasons as head coach, grabbing two Great Lakes Football Conference titles along the way.

“I think it’s an unbelievable opportunity for me to be coaching at a position like this; coaching in the MAC, which to me is fantastic,” said Esposito, the 2009 GLFC Coach of the Year. “The MAC is a great league to learn in, and also being under a great coach in Coach Cubit.”

Esposito is the final piece to a defensive staff that underwent a major shake-up after the Broncos yielded 418 offensive yards and 27.5 points a game in last year’s 5-7 season.

Originally, defensive backs coach Tim Daoust was pegged to oversee the defensive line duties in place of an ousted Peter McCarty. However, Daoust left the Broncos to join Dan Enos’ staff at Central Michigan as defensive backs coach.

“His biggest attribute, and everyone I talked to would say this, is how his kids play hard for him and how they love playing for him,” Cubit said of Esposito. “That’s something that we need on the other side.”

The Broncos’ defensive line got a quick facelift with this year’s recruiting class, boasting three tackles that hover around the 300-pound mark. The most notable was Travonte Boles, who stands at 6 feet, 305 pounds.

But in terms of revamping the team’s philosophy in the trenches, Esposito’s take had little, or nothing, to do with the Xs and Os.

“It’s mostly about getting those kids to put their best foot forward and playing as hard as you can,” Esposito said. “The schemes and stuff become secondary. Football becomes easy. Football has to be fun, too. Some of those kids might feel it wasn’t fun for them last year.”

While Cubit said a lack of intensity or drive wasn’t necessarily the defense’s downfall last season, he said a coach like Esposito will give his team a boost in those departments.

“I think there are certain guys that they just have a knack for (getting kids to play hard),” Cubit said. “They are enthusiastic about what they do and that’s what Lou does. … Lou will get them to play hard.”

With the shake-up, Cubit said it introduces healthy competition amongst defensive personnel, rushing to prove themselves to the new staff, which features former Hofstra coach Dave Cohen as defensive coordinator.

“They’re buying into it,” Cubit said. “It’s a whole new set-up so the kids aren’t going to take a chance at going after it and doing what they’ve done before, because that wasn’t good enough.”